The billboard serves a dual purpose: firstly, acting to draw students to the engineering university UTEC and secondly, to provide drinking water to whomever needs it, likely to be its neighbours.
This is an interesting project where researchers from the University of Engineering and Technology (UTEC) in Lima, Peru and advertising agency Mayo Peru DraftFCB joined forces to launch it.
The panel is strategically located in the village of Bujama, an area south of the capital city that is almost a desert, where many inhabitants have no access to clean water. What the panel does is to produce clean water from the humidity in the air, through filters. So far, the billboard has produced over 9,000 liters of drinking water or 96 liters a day.
UTEC explains that despite tough conditions with little rain, air humidity reaches 98 percent. "The panel traps humidity in the air and transforms it into water. It's that simple," said Jessica Ruas, a spokesperson from the university.
"It doesn't have to come in the shape of a billboard, but ingenuity is key to development".
Internally, the panel consists of five devices that extract water vapor from the air using a condenser and filters. Water is stored in tanks at the top of the structure. Once filtered, it flows down a pipe connected to a tap, accessible to everybody.
The internal system costs some US$1,200 (£790) to set up.
On the publicity side, the panel itself seeks to attract the "creative minds that Peru needs" to the young UTEC, which was founded only a year ago. UTEC says it wanted to put "imagination into action" and show that it is possible to solve people's problems through engineering and technology.
You might have heard the old engineering joke: Engineers aren't boring people; they just get excited about boring things. Well, the above story is certainly not boring; it is ground-breaking!
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